w wind of icar

[wwwliye]

the output variables: w and w_grid, what is the difference between them, if I want to plot vertical wind, which should I use, thank you

[gutmann]

In general, you probably want the “W” field. The W_grid field is only motion relative to the ICAR grid. Since the grid is variable over topography, that does not include most of the vertical motion created by orographic lifting, but it is useful for diagnosing fluxes between individual grid cells.